Sex, Lies & Potential Poisonings
by TrenchcoatsAreSexy
Summary: House's team investigates what appears to be a poisoning, but is more than meets the eye. Meanwhile, Kutner, Foreman, and Chase all have their own secrets to contend with.
1. Chapter 1

Sex, Lies & Potential Poisonings

Chapter One: Case in Point

"House, if you're going to keep calling my girlfriend for consults, then you need to just hire her. Stop wasting her time and dragging her all the way over here when she doesn't even work at this hospital." Dr. James Wilson's hands were firmly planted on his hips, and his brown eyes were narrowed in judgment of his best friend and colleague, Dr. Gregory House.

"Ah, but where's the fun in that?" House retorted, clacking his cane against the floor and beginning to move away from both the conversation and Wilson himself.

"You've said you've accepted Amber," Wilson reminded him.

"Does that mean I don't have the right to ask for her services?" House replied with a smile, moving a little faster, in the general direction of Cuddy's office.

"Not when you make it sound like she's a prostitute, no!" Wilson said, offended, as he followed House. "You can't out-run me, you know," he added, getting no response as House arrived at Cuddy's door and promptly opened the door before shutting it again – directly in Wilson's face.

"What did you want me for?" House inquired, talking not to Cuddy herself but instead focusing his eyes on the low-cut, soft-looking purple sweater she was sporting.

"I have a case," Cuddy replied. "And my eyes are here, you know."

"I know that, I took Anatomy," House said with a grin. "But I wasn't looking for your eyes." Cuddy found herself not caring that he wasn't looking at her eyes as she proceeded to roll them. "And why do I care if you have a case?"

"I misspoke," Cuddy responded, "_You_ have a case." She extended one hand; in it was a manila file folder. "Should I have put it in my cleavage so that you'd pay attention?"

"That would be a lot of fun," House admitted, but took the file from her as he did. As he opened it, Cuddy began to narrate the case's specifics.

"Three-year-old girl. In a coma, non-responsive. The grandmother of the girl has come forward and says she thinks the daughter is poisoning her, but CPS won't act without proof. Tox screen found traces of heavy metals, but it's not clear whether she was poisoned or even whether that's the reason for the coma." Cuddy looked at House with a somewhat pleading look.

"And the mother?" House asked.

"Crazy party girl, in her early 20's," Cuddy explained. "But… A poisoner? I don't know." She grinned and batted her eyelashes. "I guess you'll need to talk to her and find out."

"Or send Chase to talk to her," House retorted. "He seems to be good with young females. He gets their juices flowing."

"Thanks for a visual I could have really done without." Cuddy looked down and began flipping through paperwork.

"I live to serve." House walked back out of the office, glad to see that Wilson was no longer standing sentry there and waiting to talk his ear off any more.

The first member of his team he managed to encounter was Kutner, who was walking with a bounce of excitement that gave House pause.

"Did you get laid last night?" House inquired. Kutner opened his mouth to answer, and House cut him off, adding, "By a woman who wasn't pixilated?"

"It was just a good night," Kutner replied with a grin. "Not saying any more."

"Yeah, I'm sure there was a Star Wars marathon on last night or something." Kutner didn't bother to be offended. If he had been a sensitive sort, he'd have never chosen to work for House.

"What's our case?" he asked, reaching down to try and grab House's file from him.

"Little kid," House replied, pulling the file back. "Not so quick, Kutner! Mine!" He led the younger man into the conference room, where Thirteen and Taub were already assembled. "Who here was a party girl in college?" Everyone looked at Thirteen, who rolled her eyes.

"What are you getting at?" she asked.

"We have a mystery on our hands," House continued, adding spooky noises as he curled his fingers and wiggled them.

"Don't we always? What does this have to do with partying?" Thirteen pressed.

"Patient is a three-year-old female, in a coma. The mother is suspected of poisoning her with heavy metals." House paused and smiled. "See, now if Cameron were still on my team, she would take this moment to gasp and be horribly offended. But I guess poisoning your children is so last week."

"Nothing really shocks me much anymore," Taub said curtly. "Since the mother's under suspicion and the daughter is one, three, and two, in a coma – who do you propose we talk to in order to get a medical history?" House waved his hand dismissively in response.

"There's a grandmother you can talk to. If the daughter's always out partying, she's probably been watching the kid and probably knows the kid's medical history better, anyway. Plus, if CPS steps in, she'll be the likely choice for the new guardian. Kutner – talk to the grandmother." Kutner nodded.

"All right. Little old ladies love me," he said, before walking cheerfully out the door before House had a chance to make a crack. House wondered again about what had spurned on Kutner's sunnier-than-usual mood, and he resolved to find out. If Kutner was dating an incredibly hot woman, for instance, it was only right that House was given the chance to try and seduce her away – or, more likely, look at her and come up with nocturnal fantasies involving her that he would share with Wilson in an attempt to traumatize the oncologist. At that thought, House grinned.

"Taub, give the patient an MRI. And see if you can find out who Kutner is sleeping with." Taub rolled his eyes and walked out as well, not giving House a reply. "And Thirteen?"

"Yes?"

"Come with me. I have a plan." House's eyes were twinkling as he spoke. Thirteen knew that was never a good sign.


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter Two: The Usual Suspect

Kutner thought to himself, as he approached the old woman (who surprisingly, wasn't really that old – she seemed to be only in her forties) who he was about to interview, that there was a good reason why he had never wanted to become a cop.

He liked cop shows, and always had – that was true. In fact, in his apartment right now, in front of his TV, was a stack of DVDs of the entire series of _Hill__Street__Blues_, waiting to be rewatched when he finally got a chance. He would even venture to say that he'd always liked _Hill__Street__Blues_ better than _St.__Elsewhere_, even though he had once lost a date because of admitting it. But he had never wanted to be a cop.

The reason why Kutner has never wanted to be a cop is that he was convinced that he could never be good at the shell games involved in interrogations. He couldn't imagine himself as a detective without immediately imagining himself walking in and simply asking the person if they did it or not. And if it were that easy, every _Law__&__Order_fan would have become a detective.

"Why do you think your daughter poisoned her… daughter?" Kutner inquired.

_Well, there's nothing wrong with a direct approach._

"Because that child has been nothing but trouble since the second she was born."

"The baby?" Kutner asked, his eyes widening.

"No, you idiot – Celia! My daughter. Ever since the second she was born she has been a problem child. Got knocked up at age eighteen and has been even more of a train-wreck ever since." Kutner had thought it was a movie cliché, but the woman then proceeded to actually shake her umbrella in the air.

"But how does that translate to… poisoning?" Kutner pressed. "A lot of people are 'problem children', but not all of them poison their own… children."

"We used to have dogs when Celia and her brother were kids. They never lasted more than a couple years. All died mysteriously. We were blind for a long time." Kutner sighed; that did make the daughter sound a little psycho, but being a little psycho doesn't necessarily make something medically relevant or right.

"Is there anything else you can tell me?" Kutner asked. "Anything at all? Any allergies little…"

"Cola. Short for Nicola," the mother replied.

"Might have?"

"Not that I know of," she admitted.

"Any recent hospitalizations?"

"None," she replied, but Kutner sensed just that bit of hesitation. Maybe one could call it a Spidey sense of source – maybe he wouldn't make such a bad cop if he had decided to become one after all.

"Are you sure?" All he had to do was raise an eyebrow, and she hesitated again.

"There was one," she told him. "She fell down the stairs."

"Well, that's normal for a three year old," Kutner pointed out, "They are always falling down things. When was this?"

"It was when she was visiting us," the woman – I should really get her name, Kutner reminded himself – "It was like she just lost coordination and tumbled down. It wasn't like she tripped."

"What could cause loss of coordination?" House inquired, tapping the whiteboard impatiently. "Come on, come on – we're in the middle of a detective novel! Who doesn't find this exciting?" No one answered. "You're all a bunch of killjoys."

"Well, the poisoning diagnosis is still on the table," Thirteen offered at last. "Then again, what if the grandparents poisoned her, to make it look like the daughter did it?"

"Someone's been watching _Breaking__Bad_," House replied, as Thirteen rolled her eyes.

"Wouldn't that make sense?" Thirteen continued. "And no, I didn't get it off a TV show."

"Except we don't care at the moment who is poisoning little Billy…" House began.

"Cola," Kutner corrected.

"Pepsi," House replied. "What we care is what they're using. That way we can… I don't know… save them?"

"But don't you think we also should know who NOT to let around the kid?" Taub said, his first input in a while. "If the mother or grandmother is poisoning her, she might try and continue it to cover her tracks."

"Good idea, Taub. You've been assigned to toddler duty." Taub scowled.

"I really have better things to do than guard the patient's room all day, House. That's why we have hospital security."

"First of all, no, you don't have better things to do, unless you're back to cheating on the lovely Mrs. Taub." Taub opened his mouth to reply, but House continued, "And second, I got shot in this hospital, and we had a hostage situation not TOO, too long ago… so why trust hospital security when I can put one of my trusty sidekicks in charge?"

"We haven't talked to the actual mother of the kid yet," Kutner pointed out. "Maybe we ought to interview her before we jump to all of these conclusions."

"That's right!" House exclaimed loudly. "Don't jump to conclusions – 'if it happens again, I'll jump to YOUR conclusion!'" Everyone looked at him blankly. "Has no one else but me seen _Showgirls_? Really?"

"House? Is Showgirls really relevant?" Taub asked sarcastically.

"Maybe it is," House replied with a smirk. "Has anyone checked out the clubs the mother partied at? Maybe she brought in a toxin that didn't affect her but… a youngin with a less developed immune system…"

"Or," Thirteen cut in, "We COULD just talk to the mother."

"I'll call Amber," House announced. Everyone looked at him with various forms of frustrated glances.

"To do what? I'll bite," Thirteen said finally.

"To go to the club with you."

"You cannot be serious," she started.

"I'll go to the club," Taub volunteered.

"No, Taub, that's like giving an alcoholic an assignment at the bar."

"Or a Vicodin addict a job at a hospital," Taub snapped back.

"Okay, WELL, while I go cry in the corner… Thirteen, go pick out something sexy. You are going dancing."

Thirteen knew better than to argue with House by now.


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter Three: Come Dancing (It's Only Natural)

"Is there some particular reason House keeps calling me to help out on his cases? I have an actual real job, you know," Amber complained, pulling at the outfit she was trying on. "Does this make my boobs look big?"

"Yeah," Thirteen retorted. "And House is a jerk, you don't have to tell me that. Apparently when you try out for his team, you end up being an alternate for life." She shrugged. "What I'd like to know is how we're expected to check for toxins dressed like this." She gestured to the leather outfit she was wearing; all it needed was a whip and she would be ready for some kind of dominatrix convention.

"They'll probably be offering them to us," Amber replied, reaching back to let her hair down from the ponytail she had it in.

"I'm sure you'll be thrilled. I know how much you hate drug addicts."

"I don't hate drug addicts," Amber shot back. "They're not on my radar enough to hate. You're either a winner or a loser, and I don't really have time for losers."

"Because that doesn't sound stuck up at all."

"I'd rather be stuck up and right than fluffy and wrong."

"Fluffy?" Thirteen shot back. "Yeah, because I'm totally fluffy… Let's just get on with it already, before House finds something even more humiliating for the two of us to get up to."

It was about nine o'clock when the two arrived at the club, which was the time that it opened. As much as both of them would have rather searched an empty club than one full of patrons, their attempts to get the owner on the phone had been met with suspicion.

When they arrived at the door, they soon discovered why.

There were a few underage girls, clearly intoxicated, hanging on the arms of two oversized bouncers, both of whom were dressed entirely in black.

"I feel like someone ought to call the police, really," Amber murmured, but Thirteen shushed her and walked up to the bouncers.

"Hello, ladies. I need to pat you down," the first bouncer, a large Caucasian man with a moustache and goatee, announced. Amber curled up her nose as he proceeded to pat her down (more specifically, cop a feel) and thought to herself that House was probably getting a kick out of this from back in his office; she'd have to complain to Wilson and even the score somehow. He probably still had a key to House's apartment.

After Thirteen was also pat down/groped, they made their way into the club, finding their ears immediately assaulted by some sort of awful techno music. To Thirteen, this experience wasn't that far out of her comfort zone; in college, she had dealt with doubts about whether or not she had inherited Huntingdon's by partying it away, drugging it away – it was much easier and less taxing than sitting and thinking about it for hours on end.

Amber, on the other hand, was turning over in her head the number of ways that she could murder House, and which one would do the most damage. She hated losers and partiers, and she wasn't entirely sure where, in this venue, one group ended and the other began. People were grinding up against each other, yelling things that were probably come-ons but couldn't be heard over the music, anyway.

Amber hated dancing, hated large groups of drunk people and, as a rule, hated partying. She had spent her college years locked in the library, trying to get the highest grades – or trying to figure out how best to suck up to the professor.

Now, she felt completely out of her element, not to mention as if most of these idiots, if not Thirteen, were going to start laughing at her any second now.

She couldn't get out fast enough.

"I'll go check the bathrooms for toxins," she volunteered as loudly as she could. Thirteen nodded, looking too distracted by the potentially seizure-inducing multi-colored lights to give a proper reply. "Who'd you say the patient was?" she added as she crept towards the "Restrooms" sign.

"She's three," Thirteen replied, holding up three fingers. Amber curled up her nose. A toddler in a place like this? Some people just shouldn't even be parents.

"Disgusting," she declared, and, not waiting for a response, walked towards the bathrooms. She reached out, grabbing the door's handle and tentatively taking a step on to the tiled floor, hearing her heels slide against something slick. "I need a shower after this," she murmured to herself, taking another step before being jolted out of her repulsion by a loud groan.

Turning, she quickly saw the source of the sound – a woman was splayed out in the middle of the floor, and though Amber couldn't identify what she was doing immediately, she quickly knew that she didn't want to think about it all that deeply.

_That__meant__there__could__be__any__kind__of__disgusting__toxin__around__here,_ she thought. _Well,__at__least__I__don__'__t__have__OCD._

Amber crouched into one of the stalls, sticking her hand into the pocket of her coat and grabbing the sample kit, before holding her nose and taking a few samples from the stall. She stepped over the sprawled-out girl and continued at the next one.

Meanwhile, Thirteen was chatting with a young man at the bar. He was in his mid-thirties, brown hair, and had red-tinged eyes that seemed to indicate that his party had been going on at least for the past few days and didn't show many signs of ending anytime soon.

"Do you know where I can get something good?" Thirteen asked him, twirling her hair. "Like maybe some X?"

"You came to the right place," the man replied. "Come with me." Thirteen smiled blandly.

"Sounds great… hey, listen, do you know this friend of mine? Her name's Celia? She said she comes here a lot."

"Not off-hand, but we don't usually do names, if you get what I mean," the man replied. "Like, I don't even know yours."

"Laura," Thirteen replied. "Take me to your stash."

"As you request."


End file.
